1 *arabic.txt* For Vim version 7.2a. Last change: 2005 Mar 29
4 VIM REFERENCE MANUAL by Nadim Shaikli
7 Arabic Language support (options & mappings) for Vim *Arabic*
9 {Vi does not have any of these commands}
12 In order to use right-to-left and Arabic mapping support, it is
13 necessary to compile VIM with the |+arabic| feature.
15 These functions have been created by Nadim Shaikli <nadim-at-arabeyes.org>
17 It is best to view this file with these settings within VIM's GUI: >
25 Arabic is a rather demanding language in which a number of special
26 features are required. Characters are right-to-left oriented and
27 ought to appear as such on the screen (i.e. from right to left).
28 Arabic also requires shaping of its characters, meaning the same
29 character has a different visual form based on its relative location
30 within a word (initial, medial, final or stand-alone). Arabic also
31 requires two different forms of combining and the ability, in
32 certain instances, to either superimpose up to two characters on top
33 of another (composing) or the actual substitution of two characters
34 into one (combining). Lastly, to display Arabic properly one will
35 require not only ISO-8859-6 (U+0600-U+06FF) fonts, but will also
36 require Presentation Form-B (U+FE70-U+FEFF) fonts both of which are
37 subsets within a so-called ISO-10646-1 font.
39 The commands, prompts and help files are not in Arabic, therefore
40 the user interface remains the standard Vi interface.
45 o Editing left-to-right files as in the original VIM hasn't changed.
47 o Viewing and editing files in right-to-left windows. File
48 orientation is per window, so it is possible to view the same
49 file in right-to-left and left-to-right modes, simultaneously.
51 o No special terminal with right-to-left capabilities is required.
52 The right-to-left changes are completely hardware independent.
53 Only Arabic fonts are necessary.
55 o Compatible with the original VIM. Almost all features work in
56 right-to-left mode (there are liable to be bugs).
58 o Changing keyboard mapping and reverse insert modes using a single
61 o Toggling complete Arabic support via a single command.
63 o While in Arabic mode, numbers are entered from left to right. Upon
64 entering a none number character, that character will be inserted
65 just into the left of the last number.
67 o Arabic keymapping on the command line in reverse insert mode.
69 o Proper Bidirectional functionality is possible given VIM is
70 started within a Bidi capable terminal emulator.
73 Arabic Fonts *arabicfonts*
76 VIM requires monospaced fonts of which there are many out there.
77 Arabic requires ISO-8859-6 as well as Presentation Form-B fonts
78 (without Form-B, Arabic will _NOT_ be usable). It is highly
79 recommended that users search for so-called 'ISO-10646-1' fonts.
80 Do an Internet search or check www.arabeyes.org for further
81 info on where to attain the necessary Arabic fonts.
87 o Installation of fonts for X Window systems (Unix/Linux)
89 Depending on your system, copy your_ARABIC_FONT file into a
90 directory of your choice. Change to the directory containing
91 the Arabic fonts and execute the following commands:
94 % xset +fp path_name_of_arabic_fonts_directory
99 Prior to the actual usage of Arabic within VIM, a number of settings
100 need to be accounted for and invoked.
102 o Setting the Arabic fonts
104 + For VIM GUI set the 'guifont' to your_ARABIC_FONT. This is done
105 by entering the following command in the VIM window.
107 :set guifont=your_ARABIC_FONT
109 NOTE: the string 'your_ARABIC_FONT' is used to denote a complete
110 font name akin to that used in Linux/Unix systems.
111 (e.g. -misc-fixed-medium-r-normal--20-200-75-75-c-100-iso10646-1)
113 You can append the 'guifont' set command to your .vimrc file
114 in order to get the same above noted results. In other words,
115 you can include ':set guifont=your_ARABIC_FONT' to your .vimrc
118 + Under the X Window environment, you can also start VIM with
119 '-fn your_ARABIC_FONT' option.
121 o Setting the appropriate character Encoding
122 To enable the correct Arabic encoding the following command needs
127 to your .vimrc file (entering the command manually into you VIM
128 window is highly discouraged). In short, include ':set
129 encoding=utf-8' to your .vimrc file.
131 Attempts to use Arabic without UTF-8 will result the following
135 Arabic requires UTF-8, do ':set encoding=utf-8'
137 o Enable Arabic settings [short-cut]
139 In order to simplify and streamline things, you can either invoke
140 VIM with the command-line option,
142 % vim -A my_utf8_arabic_file ...
144 or enable 'arabic' via the following command within VIM
148 The two above noted possible invocations are the preferred manner
149 in which users are instructed to proceed. Baring an enabled 'termbidi'
150 setting, both command options:
152 1. set the appropriate keymap
153 2. enable the deletion of a single combined pair character
154 3. enable rightleft mode
155 4. enable rightleftcmd mode (affecting the command-line)
156 5. enable arabicshape mode (do visual character alterations)
158 You may also append the command to your .vimrc file and simply
159 include ':set arabic' to it.
161 You are also capable of disabling Arabic support via
165 which resets everything that the command had enabled without touching
166 the global settings as they could affect other possible open buffers.
167 In short the 'noarabic' command,
169 1. resets to the alternate keymap
170 2. disables the deletion of a single combined pair character
171 3. disables rightleft mode
173 NOTE: the 'arabic' command takes into consideration 'termbidi' for
174 possible external bi-directional (bidi) support from the
175 terminal ("mlterm" for instance offers such support).
176 'termbidi', if available, is superior to rightleft support
177 and its support is preferred due to its level of offerings.
178 'arabic' when 'termbidi' is enabled only sets the keymap.
180 If, on the other hand, you'd like to be verbose and explicit and
181 are opting not to use the 'arabic' short-cut command, here's what
182 is needed (i.e. if you use ':set arabic' you can skip this section) -
184 + Arabic Keymapping Activation
186 To activate the Arabic keymap (i.e. to remap your English/Latin
187 keyboard to look-n-feel like a standard Arabic one), set the
188 'keymap' command to "arabic". This is done by entering
192 in your VIM window. You can also append the 'keymap' set command to
193 your .vimrc file. In other words, you can include ':set keymap=arabic'
196 To turn toggle (or switch) your keymapping between Arabic and the
197 default mapping (English), it is advised that users use the 'CTRL-^'
198 key press while in insert (or add/replace) mode. The command-line
199 will display your current mapping by displaying an "Arabic" string
200 next to your insertion mode (e.g. -- INSERT Arabic --) indicating
203 + Arabic deletion of a combined pair character
205 By default VIM has the 'delcombine' option disabled. This option
206 allows the deletion of ALEF in a LAM_ALEF (LAA) combined character
207 and still retain the LAM (i.e. it reverts to treating the combined
208 character as its natural two characters form -- this also pertains
209 to harakat and their combined forms). You can enable this option
214 in our VIM window. You can also append the 'delcombine' set command
215 to your .vimrc file. In other words, you can include ':set delcombine'
218 + Arabic right-to-left Mode
220 By default VIM starts in Left-to-right mode. 'rightleft' is the
221 command that allows one to alter a window's orientation - that can
224 - Toggling between left-to-right and right-to-left modes is
225 accomplished through ':set rightleft' and ':set norightleft'.
227 - While in Left-to-right mode, enter ':set rl' in the command line
228 ('rl' is the abbreviation for rightleft).
230 - Put the ':set rl' line in your '.vimrc' file to start Vim in
231 right-to-left mode permanently.
233 + Arabic right-to-left command-line Mode
235 For certain commands the editing can be done in right-to-left mode.
236 Currently this is only applicable to search commands.
238 This is controlled with the 'rightleftcmd' option. The default is
239 "search", which means that windows in which 'rightleft' is set will
240 edit search commands in right-left mode. To disable this behavior,
244 To enable right-left editing of search commands again,
248 + Arabic Shaping Mode
250 To activate the required visual characters alterations (shaping,
251 composing, combining) which the Arabic language requires, enable
252 the 'arabicshape' command. This is done by entering
256 in our VIM window. You can also append the 'arabicshape' set
257 command to your .vimrc file. In other words, you can include
258 ':set arabicshape' to your .vimrc file.
261 Keymap/Keyboard *arabickeymap*
264 The character/letter encoding used in VIM is the standard UTF-8.
265 It is widely discouraged that any other encoding be used or even
268 Note: UTF-8 is an all encompassing encoding and as such is
269 the only supported (and encouraged) encoding with
270 regard to Arabic (all other proprietary encodings
271 should be discouraged and frowned upon).
275 + CTRL-^ in insert/replace mode toggles between Arabic/Latin mode
277 + Keyboard mapping is based on the Microsoft's Arabic keymap (the
278 defacto standard in the Arab world):
280 +---------------------------------------------------------------------+
281 |! |@ |# |$ |% |^ |& |* |( |) |_ |+ || |~ ّ |
282 |1 ١ |2 ٢ |3 ٣ |4 ٤ |5 ٥ |6 ٦ |7 ٧ |8 ٨ |9 ٩ |0 ٠ |- |= |\ |` ذ |
283 +---------------------------------------------------------------------+
284 |Q َ |W ً |E ُ |R ٌ |T لإ |Y إ |U ` |I ÷ |O x |P ؛ |{ < |} > |
285 |q ض |w ص |e ث |r ق |t ف |y غ |u ع |i ه |o خ |p ح |[ ج |] د |
286 +-----------------------------------------------------------+
287 |A ِ |S ٍ |D [ |F ] |G لأ |H أ |J ـ |K ، |L / |: |" |
288 |a ش |s س |d ي |f ب |g ل |h ا |j ت |k ن |l م |; ك |' ط |
289 +------------------------------------------------------+
290 |Z ~ |X ْ |C { |V } |B لآ |N آ |M ' |< , |> . |? ؟ |
291 |z ئ |x ء |c ؤ |v ر |b لا |n ى |m ة |, و |. ز |/ ظ |
292 +-------------------------------------------------+
297 o VIM in its GUI form does not currently support Bi-directionality
298 (i.e. the ability to see both Arabic and Latin intermixed within
305 There is one known minor bug,
307 1. If you insert a haraka (e.g. Fatha (U+064E)) after a LAM (U+0644)
308 and then insert an ALEF (U+0627), the appropriate combining will
309 not happen due to the sandwiched haraka resulting in something
310 that will NOT be displayed correctly.
312 WORK-AROUND: Don't include harakats between LAM and ALEF combos.
313 In general, don't anticipate to see correct visual
314 representation with regard to harakats and LAM+ALEF
315 combined characters (even those entered after both
316 characters). The problem noted is strictly a visual
317 one, meaning saving such a file will contain all the
318 appropriate info/encodings - nothing is lost.
320 No other bugs are known to exist.
322 vim:tw=78:ts=8:ft=help:norl: